The moon the merest sliver of reflected light on this morning's pre-dawn drive, but that resplendent sliver illuminating the mountains and valleys of her darkened surface: oh, Lord, to be even the merest sliver reflecting Your light.

1. What is the controlling idea (thesis) of your essay?
2. Why have you developed this controlling idea?
3. Who is the audience for your essay? Name the publication you have chosen, and describe what you know of its readers, as fully as possible, in a well developed paragraph.

Sentence Outline
A sentence outline means that every statement in your outline must be an assertion about your topic in a complete sentence; do not use mere words or phrases (including “introduction” and “conclusion”). Do not use phrasing like “I am going to write about . . .”: this does not give me helpful information but is almost always a mere vague idea about the topic. The point of the outline is to get beyond these vague ideas to specific assertions.

For example: do NOT write “Here I will write here about the importance of attending closely to a text when reading.” This gives no specific information. Rather, write something like “A reader cannot understand a text if he does not attend closely to its words and phrases within their context; instead, he will tend to react emotionally to his own ideas imposed on the text and miss the author’s recorded meaning.” Now we see that it is important and why.

Form
Create an outline for your essay, listing in sentence form each main idea which supports your controlling idea, and, still in sentence form, how that idea will be supported. This does not have to be a formal outline structure (I. A. 1. a. etc.), but it does need to have a clear, obvious structure of some kind, especially differentiating main points that support the CI and the subordinate points that support those main points. Use indentions, for example, for the levels of your outline: help me to see its structure quickly. See the sample below for how this might look.

Sources
Under each section (main supporting idea) of the outline, list the sources that you will use to make your case, giving the specific information from these sources that will help you to make your point. Quotations are excellent here, but don’t rely on the quotations to explain themselves. Note page numbers to help you find the information easily when you begin drafting the essay.

Citations
The first time you cite a source in your outline, give the full name of the author and the book or article.

After that first reference, simply give the author’s name (title if needed to distinguish among multiple sources by one author).

If you add sources here that did not appear in your annotated bibliography, at the end of the outline give the MLA citation and a short annotation that explains why the source is credible. This is the only “works cited” needed to go with the outline.

Sample Outline Section
Following is a representation of how each section of your outline should appear. You should, of course, double space as usual.

* (Main Idea 2) Reading well requires attending to the words of the text in their complete context without assuming their meaning based on immdiate emotional reaction to words and phrases.

# (Supporting Idea 1) Students often react emotionally to texts they read without careful consideration of context.

— (Evidence in complete sentences) “They read in this superficial way with regularity, noticing only the details that confirm a personal prejudice or unrealistic hope”: the writer’s examples confirm specific ways that students read emotionally, such as seeing certain words in a poem (“whiskey,” “beat”) and assuming they denote abuse even when they clearly do not. (author’s full name and full title of the article go here)

— (Evidence in complete sentences) (full name and title; or last name only if already referenced earlier in the outline)

# (Supporting Idea 2) Attending to text while setting aside emotional reactions as much as possible allows readers to be more likely to grasp the author’s intention before responding to it.

— (Evidence in complete sentences) (full name and title; or last name only if already referenced earlier in the outline)

— (Evidence in complete sentences) (full name and title; or last name only if already referenced earlier in the outline)

— (Evidence in complete sentences) (full name and title; or last name only if already referenced earlier in the outline)

New Sources
At the end of your outline, list bibliographic citations for any sources not contained in your original Annotated Bibliograpy, with brief annotations giving the reason(s) they are credible sources. Use the same format as you did for the Annotated Bibliography, but your annotations will be just a sentence or two.

Submission
Always do one last proofreading before submitting your work.

Don’t forget to check that your pages are in order, that the ink is dark and legible without streaks, lines, or smears of any sort (or coffee stains, wrinkles, etc.). Don’t wait until the last minute to print your work so that if the initial product is not of high quality you will have plenty of time to find another printer and re-do it.

(If you use a printer that has low quality of print for this or any project, please report this immediately to the Help Desk [you can email or call x333]: IT employees can’t know there is a problem unless they are informed.)

Header Photo

Many thanks to Keiller Impson for the moon photo used as my header.

Disclaimer

This website is not affiliated with any of the organizations or institutions at which Dr. Impson is employed and/or with which she is affiliated. Links to any sites are not endorsements of the contents of those sites.